The Book of Black Magic and of Pacts

The book of black magic and of pacts:including the rites and mysteries of goëtic theurgy, sorcery, and infernal necromancy is an attempt by Arthur Edward Waite to synthesize the procedures of famous Grimoires. It draws on the Key of Solomon, the Grimorium Verum, Cornelius Agrippa's apocryphal Fourth Book of Occult Philosophy, and many others.

Although disapproving of the application of magic and the black arts in his introduction, he analyzes the various Grimoires which results in a look at the details of ceremonial magic of the past.

Part I provides the essential passages from leading magical texts from the fourteenth, fifteenth, and sixteenth centuries. Part II is a more systematically organized version of these ancient texts, adapted by Waite to the ways of the modern academic.

Waite defends those victims persecuted throughout history because of their participation in superstitious beliefs. He also speaks positively about astrology and alchemy.

The modern reader is given an understanding of the beliefs in the black arts that were rooted in our civilization's past.